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WWE
WWF Logo 0.jpg WWF Logo 1.png WWF Logo 2.png WWF Logo 3.png WWE Logo 1.png WWE Logo 2.jpg World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc. (WWE) is an American publicly traded, privately controlled entertainment company that deals primarily in professional wrestling, with major revenue sources also coming from film, music, product licensing and direct product sales. The WWE also refers to the professional wrestling promotion itself, founded by Jess McMahon and Toots Mondt in 1952 as Capitol Wrestling Corporation, and as of 2014, the largest in the world, holding approximately 320 televised and non-televised events a year, and broadcasting to about 36 million viewers in more than 150 countries. The company's headquarters are located in Stamford, Connecticut, with offices in New York City, Los Angeles, London, Shanghai, Tokyo, Singapore, Munich, Mumbai, and Mexico City. As in other professional wrestling promotions, WWE shows are not legitimate sporting contests, but purely entertainment-based, featuring storyline-driven, scripted, and choreographed matches, though they often include moves that can put performers at risk of injury if not performed correctly. WWE first publicly acknowledged this in 1981, breaking the gentlemen's agreement that previously existed among promoters. Since the 1980s, WWE publicly branded their product as sports entertainment, which is considered to acknowledge the product's roots in competitive sport and dramatic theater. The company's majority owner is its chairman and CEO, Vince McMahon, who retains a 42% ownership of the company's outstanding stock and 83% of the voting power. The current entity was previously known as Titan Sports, Incorporated on February 21, 1980 which acquired Capitol Wrestling Corporation (the holding company for the World Wrestling Federation) in 1982 and later formed a separate corporation in Delaware that may have initially been called WWF, Inc. before being renamed Titan Sports, Inc. which is then legally merged the Massachusetts corporation. Titan was renamed World Wrestling Federation, Inc. in 1998, then World Wrestling Federation Entertainment, Inc. in 1999 and finally World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc. in 2002. Since 2011, the company has officially branded itself solely as "WWE", which is no longer an initialism, though the company's legal name was not changed. WWE Links Current TV/WWE Network Shows WWE Raw Button.png|link=WWE Raw WWE SmackDown Button.png|link=WWE SmackDown WWE Main Event Button.png|link=WWE Main Event WWE 205 Button.png|link=WWE 205 Live WWE NXT Button.png|link=WWE NXT WWE NXT UK Button.png|link=WWE NXT UK WWE Network Button.png|link=WWE Network Specials WWE Total Button.png|link=Total Divas WWE PPV Button.png|Pre WWE Network|link=WWE Pay Per Views Button WWE Backstage.png|link=WWE Backstage Current WWE Championships WWE Raw Buttons WWE Title.png|link=WWE Championship Buttons US Title.png|link=WWE United States Championship Buttons Raw Tag Title.png|link=WWE Raw Tag Team Championship Buttons Raw Womens Title.png|link=WWE Raw Women's Championship Button WWE Womens Tag.png|link=WWE Women's Tag Team Championship Button_24-7_Championship.png|link=WWE 24/7 Championship WWE SmackDown Button_WWE_Universal_Championship_Blue.png|link=WWE Universal Championship Buttons IC Title.png|link=WWE Intercontinental Championship Buttons SD Tag Title.png|link=WWE SmackDown Tag Team Championship Buttons SD Womens Title.png|link=WWE SmackDown Women's Championship Button WWE Womens Tag.png|link=WWE Women's Tag Team Championship Button_24-7_Championship.png|link=WWE 24/7 Championship WWE 205 Live Button_NXT_Cruiserweight_Championship.png|link=WWE Cruiserweight Championship Button_24-7_Championship.png|link=WWE 24/7 Championship WWE NXT Buttons NXT Title.png|link=NXT Championship Buttons NXT NA Title.png|link=NXT North American Championship Buttons NXT Tag Title.png|link=NXT Tag Team Championship Buttons Women's Tag Title.png|link=NXT Women's Championship Button_NXT_Cruiserweight_Championship.png|link=WWE Cruiserweight Championship Button WWE Womens Tag.png|link=WWE Women's Tag Team Championship WWE NXT UK Misc Buttons UK Title.png|link=WWE United Kingdom Championship WWE United Kingdom Womens Championship Button.png|link=NXT United Kingdom Women's Championship Button NXT UK Tag.png|link=NXT United Kingdom Tag Team Championship Other Programs Buttons Mix Matched Challenge.png|link=WWE Mixed Match Challenge Buttons Mae Young Classic.png|link=WWE Mae Young Classic Buttons Afterburn.png|link=WWE Afterburn Buttons Bottom Line.png|link=WWE Bottom Line Buttons Vintage.png|link=WWE Vintage Collection Buttons Experience.png|link=The WWE Experience Buttons This Week.png|link=The Week in WWE Current WWE Accomplishments * Mens and Womens Royal Rumble * Mens and Women's Money in the Bank * Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal * WrestleMania Women's Battle Royal * King of the Ring Former Programming Button Heavyweight Championship.png|link=WWWF Heavyweight Wrestling Button Allstar Championship.png|link=WWF All-Star Wrestling Button Championship Wrestling.png|link=WWF Championship Wrestling Button All American Wrestling.png|link=WWF All American Wrestling Button Tuesday Night Titans.png|link=WWF Tuesday Night Titans Button Wrestling Sporlight.png|link=WWF Wrestling Spotlight Button Prime Time.png|link=WWF Prime Time Wrestling Button WWF SNME.png|link=WWF Saturday Night's Main Event Button WWF Superstars.png|link=WWF Superstars of Wrestling Buttons Wrestling Challenge.png|link=WWF Wrestling Challenge Buttons WWF Main Event.png|link=WWF The Main Event Button WWF Mania.png|link=WWF Mania Button Action Zone.png|link=WWF Action Zone Button Sunday Slam.png|link=WWF Sunday Night Slam Button Livewire.png|link=WWF LiveWire Button FNME.png|link=WWF Friday Night's Main Event Button Shotgun.png|link=WWF Shotgun Saturday Night Button Heat.png|link=WWE Heat Button Super Astros.png|link=WWF Super Astros Button Jakked.png|link=WWF Jakked Button Metal.png|link=WWF Metal Buttons Excess.png|link=WWF Excess Buttons Confidential.png|link=WWE Confidential Buttons Velocity.png|link=WWE Velocity Buttons WWECW.png|link=WWE ECW Buttons MSG Classics.png|link=WWE MSG Classics Buttons WWE SNME.png|link=WWE Saturday Night's Main Event Buttons NXT1.png|link=WWE NXT (Competition Version) Buttons SMS.png|link=WWE Saturday Morning Slam Buttons Tough Enough.png|link=WWE Tough Enough Buttons CWC.png|link=WWE Cruiserweight Classic Buttons WWE Superstars.png|link=WWE Superstars Former WWE Championships * WWWF United States Tag Team Championship - 1958-1967 * WWWF United States Championship - 1966-1973 * WWF North American Heavyweight Championship - 1979-1981 * WWF International Heavyweight Championship - 1959-1984 * WWF Junior Heavyweight Championship - 1967-1985 * WWF International Tag Team Championship - 1969-1985 * WWF Women's Tag Team Championship - 1970-1989 * WWF World Martial Arts Heavyweight Championship 1978-1989 * WWF Canadian Championship - 1985-1986 * WWF Million Dollar Championship - 1989-2010 * WWF Intercontinental Tag Team Championship 1991 * WWF Light Heavyweight Championship - 1997-2001 * WWE European Championship - 1997-2002 * WWE Hardcore Championship - 1998-2002 * WCW Championship - 2001 * WCW Tag Team Championship - 2001 * ECW Championship - 2006-2010 * WWE Divas Championship - 2008-2016 Former WWE Accomplishments * Brawl For All Special WWE Pages * WWE Hall of Fame * WWE Alumni * WWE Brand Extension * WWE Tag Teams * WWE Network WWE History History The beginning/Capitol Wrestling Roderick James "Jess" McMahon was a boxing promoter whose achievements included co-promoting a bout in 1915 between Jess Willard and Jack Johnson. In 1926, while working with Tex Rickard (who actually despised wrestling to such a degree he prevented wrestling events from being held at Madison Square Garden between 1939 and 1948), he started promoting boxing in Madison Square Garden in New York. The first match during their partnership was a light-heavyweight championship match between Jack Delaney and Paul Berlenbach. Around the same time, professional wrestler Joseph Raymond "Toots" Mondt created a new style of professional wrestling that he called Slam Bang Western Style Wrestling to make the sport more appealing to spectators. He then formed a promotion with wrestling champion Ed Lewis and his manager Billy Sandow. They persuaded many wrestlers to sign contracts with their Gold Dust Trio. After much success, a disagreement over power caused the trio to dissolve and, with it, their promotion. Mondt formed partnerships with several other promoters, including Jack Curley in New York City. When Curley was dying, Mondt moved to take over New York wrestling with the aid of several bookers, one of whom was Jess McMahon. Together, Roderick McMahon and Raymond Mondt created the Capitol Wrestling Corporation (CWC). The CWC joined the National Wrestling Alliance in 1953. Also in that year, Ray Fabiani, one of Mondt's associates, brought in Vincent J. McMahon to replace his father Jess in the promotion. McMahon and Mondt were a successful combination, and within a short time, they controlled approximately 70% of the NWA's booking, largely due to their dominance in the heavily populated Northeast region. Mondt taught McMahon about booking and how to work in the wrestling business. World Wide Wrestling Federation The NWA recognized an undisputed NWA World Heavyweight Champion that went from wrestling company to wrestling company in the alliance and defended the belt around the world. In 1963, the champion was Buddy Rogers. The rest of the NWA was unhappy with Mondt because he rarely allowed Rogers to wrestle outside of the Northeast. Mondt and McMahon wanted Rogers to keep the NWA World Championship, but Rogers was unwilling to sacrifice his $25,000 deposit on the belt (title holders at the time had to pay a deposit to insure they would honor their commitments as champion). Rogers lost the NWA World Championship to Lou Thesz in a one-fall match in Toronto, Ontario on January 24, 1963, which led to Mondt, McMahon and the CWC leaving the NWA in protest, creating the World Wide Wrestling Federation (WWWF) in the process. In April, Rogers was awarded the new WWWF World Championship following an apocryphal tournament in Rio de Janeiro. He lost the title to Bruno Sammartino a month later on May 17, 1963, after suffering a heart attack shortly before the match. To accommodate Rogers' condition, the match was booked to last under a minute. Mondt left the company in the late sixties for unclear reasons, probably due to old age. Although the WWWF had withdrawn from the NWA, Vince McMahon Sr. still sat on the NWA Board of Directors, no other territory was recognized in the Northeast, and several "champion vs. champion" matches occurred (usually ending in a double disqualification or some other non-decisive ending). In March 1979, the WWWF became the World Wrestling Federation (WWF). The change was purely cosmetic, and the ownership and front office personnel remained unchanged during this period. World Wrestling Federation In 1980, the son of Vincent J. McMahon, Vincent K. McMahon, founded Titan Sports, Inc. and in 1982 purchased Capitol Wrestling Corporation from his father. The elder McMahon had long since established the northeastern territory as one of the most vibrant members of the NWA. He had long since recognized that professional wrestling was more about entertainment than actual sport. Against his father's wishes, McMahon began an expansion process that would fundamentally change the sport, and place both the WWF - and his own life - in jeopardy. The WWF was not the only promotion to have broken ranks with the NWA; the American Wrestling Association (AWA) had long ago ceased being an official NWA member (although like the WWF, they seldom left their own territory). But in neither instance did the defecting member attempt to undermine, and destroy, the territory system that had been the foundation of the industry for more than half a century. Other promoters were furious when McMahon began syndicating WWF television shows to television stations across the United States, in areas outside of the WWF's traditional northeastern stronghold. McMahon also began selling videotapes of WWF events outside the Northeast through his Coliseum Video distribution company. He effectively broke the unwritten law of regionalism around which the entire industry had been based. To make matters worse, McMahon would use the income generated by advertising, television deals, and tape sales to poach talent from rival promoters. Wrestling promoters nationwide were now in direct competition with the WWF. The first step in McMahon's attempt to go national was to sign AWA superstar Hulk Hogan, who, due to his appearance in Rocky III had a national recognition that few other wrestlers could manage. To play Hogan's nemesis, he signed North Carolina badboy Roddy Piper, and also another bodybuilder in the Billy Graham mold, Jesse Ventura (although Ventura rarely wrestled in the WWF at that point due to the lung disorder that caused his retirement, moving to the commentator booth alongside Gorilla Monsoon). McMahon built a superstar roster consisting of these men on top, in addition to New York mainstays like André the Giant, Jimmy Snuka and Don Muraco, and wandering journeymen like Paul Orndorff, Greg Valentine, Ricky Steamboat and The Iron Sheik. It has long been a point of contention whether McMahon could have gone national without Hogan's presence, or vice versa. According to several reports, the elder McMahon warned his son: "Vinny, what are you doing? You'll wind up at the bottom of a river." In spite of such warnings, the younger McMahon had an even bolder ambition: the WWF would tour nationally. However, such a venture required huge capital investment; one that placed the WWF on the verge of financial collapse. The future of not just McMahon's experiment, but also the WWF, the NWA, and the whole industry came down to the success or failure of McMahon's groundbreaking concept, WrestleMania. WrestleMania was a pay-per-view extravaganza (in some areas; most areas of the country saw WrestleMania available on closed-circuit television) that McMahon marketed as being the Super Bowl of professional wrestling. The concept of a wrestling super card was nothing new in North America; the NWA had been running Starrcade a few years prior to WrestleMania, and even the elder McMahon had marketed large Shea Stadium cards viewable in closed-circuit locations. However, McMahon wanted to take the WWF to the mainstream, targeting the public who were not regular wrestling fans. He drew the interest of the mainstream media by inviting celebrities such as Mr. T and Cyndi Lauper to participate in the event. MTV, in particular, featured a great deal of WWF coverage and programming at this time, in what was termed the Rock 'n' Wrestling Connection. The Golden Age The original WrestleMania, held in 1985, was a resounding success. This event is sometimes credited as the debut of what McMahon called "sports entertainment." However, as mentioned above, his father had emphasized pro wrestling's entertainment value some years before. The WWF did incredible business on the shoulders of McMahon and his all-American babyface hero, Hulk Hogan, for the next several years, creating what some observers dubbed a second golden age for professional wrestling. However, by the 1990s the WWF's fortunes steadily declined as fans were tired of Hulk Hogan's ability to beat anyone and everyone whenever he wanted. The New Generation The WWF hit a low point in the wake of allegations of steroid abuse and distribution made against McMahon and the WWF in 1994; there were also allegations of sexual harassment made by WWF employees. McMahon was eventually exonerated, but it was a public relations nightmare for the WWF. The steroid trial cost the WWF an estimated $5 million at a time when revenues were at an all-time low. To compensate, McMahon cut the pay of both wrestlers and front office personnel - close to 40% in the latter case (and about 50% for top level managers such as Bobby Heenan and Jimmy Hart, who both left). This helped drive many WWF wrestlers to its only major competition, World Championship Wrestling (WCW), between 1993 and 1996. During this time period, WWF promoted itself as "The New WWF Generation" which was led by Shawn Michaels, Diesel, Razor Ramon, Bret Hart, and The Undertaker. In an effort to promote them and other young talent as the new superstars of the ring WWF began to play on the age restrictions which former WWF wrestlers such as Hulk Hogan and Randy Savage (who by now were working for WCW) now faced. This is best seen in the Billionaire Ted parodies of 1996 (a reference to WCW's owner and patron, media mogul Ted Turner) which culminated in a "rasslin" match during the warm-up to WWE WrestleMania 12. The Attitude Era During the 1990s wrestling boom, starting with Steve Austin's now infamous Austin 3:16 speech, shortly after defeating Jake Roberts in the tournament finals at the 1996 King of the Ring pay-per-view, the WWF moved away from its "family era" and began broadcasting more violence, swearing, and more edgy angles in its attempt to compete with WCW. After Bret Hart left for WCW following the infamous Montreal Screwjob incident, Vince McMahon used the resulting backlash in the creation of his "Mr. McMahon" character, a dictatorial and fierce ruler who favored heels who were "good for business" over "misfit" faces like Austin. This, in turn, led to the Austin vs. McMahon feud, which, along with the formation of D-Generation X, laid the foundation for the Attitude Era. The Attitude Era also featured the established Monday Night Wars, where both WCW and the WWF had Monday night shows that competed against each other in the ratings. Business advances On April 29, 1999, the WWF made its return to terrestrial television by launching a special program known as SmackDown'' on the fledgling UPN network. The Thursday-night show became a weekly series on August 26, 1999.'' On the back of the success of the Attitude Era, on October 19, 1999 the WWF's parent company, Titan Sports (by this time renamed World Wrestling Federation Entertainment, Inc.) became a publicly traded company, offering 10 million shares priced at $17 each. WWF announced its desire to diversify, including creating The World, a nightclub in Times Square]], WWE Films; producing feature films, and book publishing. In 2000 the WWF, in collaboration with television network NBC, announced the creation of the XFL, a new professional American football league that debuted in 2001. The league had surprisingly high ratings for the first few weeks, but initial interest waned and its ratings plunged to dismally low levels (one of its games was the lowest-rated primetime show in the history of American television). NBC walked out on the venture after only one season, but McMahon intended to continue alone. However, after UPN demanded that SmackDown! be cut by half an hour, McMahon shut down the XFL. Acquisition of WCW and ECW With the success of the Attitude Era, WCW's already shaky financial situation deteriorated even further. It only survived because Ted Turner retained control over it as a result of Turner Broadcasting System's merger with Time Warner. However, after Time Warner merged with AOL, Turner's power was considerably reduced, and the newly merged company decided to shed its dead weight, namely WCW which was now losing scores of millions of dollars each year. In March 2001, WWF Entertainment, Inc. acquired World Championship Wrestling, Inc. from AOL Time Warner for a number reported to be around $7 million. The assets of Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW), which had folded after filing for bankruptcy protection in April 2001, were purchased by WWE in mid-2003. World Wrestling Entertainment In 2000, the World Wildlife Fund (also WWF), an environmental organization now called the World Wide Fund for Nature, sued the World Wrestling Federation. A British court agreed that Titan Sports had violated a 1994 agreement which had limited the permissible use of the WWF initials overseas, particularly in merchandising. On Sunday May 5, 2002, the company quietly changed all references on its website from "WWF" to "WWE", while switching the URL from WWF.com to WWE.com. The next day, a press release announced the official name change from World Wrestling Federation Entertainment, Inc. to World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc., or WWE, and the change was publicized later that day during a telecast of Monday Night RAW, which emanated from the Hartford Civic Center in Hartford, Connecticut. For a short time, WWE used the slogan "Get The 'F' Out". The company had also been ordered by court to stop using the old WWF Attitude logo on any of its properties and to censor all past references to WWF, as they no longer owned the copyrights to the initials WWF in 'specified circumstances'. In April 2002, about a month before the name change, WWE decided to create two separate rosters, one on RAW, the other on SmackDown due to the overabundance of talent left over from the Invasion storyline (which involved talent from the absorbed ECW and WCW rosters interacting in WWF storylines). This is known as the WWE Brand Extension. Following the Brand Extension, a yearly WWE Draft Lottery was instituted to exchange members of each roster and generally refresh the lineups. On May 26, 2006, WWE revived Extreme Championship Wrestling as its third brand. The new ECW program airs Tuesday nights, on the Sci Fi Channel.On February 23, 2010, ECW was replaced by WWE NXT. See Also * WCW - World Championship Wrestling * ECW - Extreme Championship Wrestling